Bulletproof
by Dayja
Summary: Sherlock finds out the hard way that being shot at does occasionally involve being shot.


Title: Bulletproof  
Author: Dayja  
Summery: Sherlock finds out the hard way that being shot at does occasionally involve being shot. (Story idea from Sherlock Holmes kink meme)  
Genre/fandom/spoilers: Sherlock BBC, no real spoilers, hurt/comfort, gen (though read into it whatever you like)  
Warnings: violence, blood, violent injury  
Rating: Pg-13  
Length: 1,500 words  
Disclaimer: I don't own, am not associated with, and am making no money from _Sherlock_.

The story:

He was running, not in a straight predictable line but in a zigzag pattern which meant that the following man's attempt to show displeasure at his investigations had a very small chance of success. Not zero percent of course; Sherlock knew that. As a purely hypothetical concept, he had of course considered the chance that his choice in career could one day mean a bullet finding its mark. But this wasn't a highly trained assassin; it was a nobody, a thug. And while Sherlock liked to proudly declare his ignorance when it came to popular films, there were some concepts that were impossible to completely delete, like that the Good Guy can't be taken down by a stray lucky shot from a person who in the drama of his life would amount to extra # 3 with gun.

So for all his genius, Sherlock really isn't expecting it when the zigzag pattern isn't enough.

He's running, and the puzzles are aligning themselves before him, revealing the plot, and it's oh so brilliant, it truly is, when a sensation similar to being hit by a car knocks him off his feet.

He honestly did not know what had happened at first. He was lying on the ground, his body twisted so he's on his side and still not completely sure the car hypothesis wasn't what happened from the way his entire body felt shattered, though in a purely abstract way where there wasn't actual pain. And he stayed lying like that because moving seemed like it might be a bad idea.

Then memory and deductive skills rebooted and asserted themselves and told him exactly how stupid he had been right around the time the pain hit.

He knew he was shot, though not where, something he would normally be fascinated by but under the circumstances he only wished for ignorance. And not only did he know he had been shot, he remembered that there was a shooter who did the shooting and that he was alone and lying helpless in such a way that said shooter would have little difficulty finishing him off. So he ignored all his bodily instincts and opened eyes he hadn't even realized he'd closed and pulled himself to lie flat on his back with the vague idea of defending himself. What he might have done if his would-be murderer really were standing over him, he hadn't quite worked out. Bleed on him perhaps. He wasn't there.

No one was there.

Sherlock had been alone many times in his life; he preferred it much of the time. Never before had being on his own felt quite this Alone.

His back was wet. So was his front. The air stank of blood. He still didn't know exactly where he had been hit; there was no single sharp pain so much as one huge all over Pain, overlapping with sensations of wet, of cold, of the taste of copper, of the smell of blood, of the shock of being Wrong, of being mortal. How he could feel so much and still feel completely numb and empty, not yet even trying any obvious life saving technics, not even trying to get up or to move…

He didn't want to be alone.

His phone was in his pocket. His fingers felt heavy and clumsy dragging it out. There was no way a text would work. Speed dial was easiest to manage. It rang four times before John picked up.

"Sherlock?" And suddenly, just hearing John's voice made Sherlock realize exactly what was happening and his voice caught in his throat and he had never wanted anything more in his life than John. He started shaking then, and it was all he could do to keep the phone by his ear, never mind answering.

"Sherlock?" the voice was starting to sound annoyed and just a bit worried.

"John," he finally managed to choke out, and there was a noise in the phone that might have been someone breathing in sharply.

"Sherlock, where are you?" John's voice sounded strong and confident, the sort a commander would give to an underling, the sort of a doctor taking control. For once, Sherlock was happy to let someone else be in control. He knew he should answer. He should answer and then John wouldn't be a voice in the phone, he would be a solid strong, warm person. He would take away the pain. He would take away the Alone.

"John," he said again, his voice breaking and hitching in the most distressing and repugnant manner but just then he couldn't care.

"Sherlock, tell me where you are!"

And it was hard to speak, hard to think, his brain didn't want to provide the answer. Of course he knew where he was, he knew every street he knew…he knew…

"Joh…"

He knew he was dying. Alone. He was going to fall into the darkness and there would be no John, and maybe there would be nothing at all and he was scared. He had been scared before, though it wasn't something he liked to admit to, anymore than he could admit to love. Fear meant giving in to emotions, useless. And now the Fear swallowed him, with the cold and the wet and the Pain and the Alone. He wanted John to come and hold him with his warm sweater and warm heart and steady hands that could fix him and take away the pain.

John's voice was still in his ear; it had taken a slightly hysterical edge. He clung to it. He wasn't Alone, he wasn't Alone.

And then he wasn't alone because there were shouts and footsteps and familiar voices that weren't John and didn't bring warmth but they did push against his bloody chest and it HURT.

And someone took away John's voice, and he tried to call for him again but his lungs didn't seem to work and blood tasted foul and someone nearby was swearing and someone else was shouting, and Lestrade, familiar, good, not John, leaned over him and told him John was coming and told him he'd be just fine, that he'd be fine, but he was lying. Even when he was dying, Sherlock's brain worked well enough to know that.

And then the world went heavy and completely empty of air.

And then it just went.

It came back.

And he wasn't cold or wet and the world smelt like plastic and was heavy and floaty. It also had John. Sherlock took a moment to wonder if he had died and there was an afterlife and perhaps it wasn't a bad one if he didn't have to wait for John to join him, which was probably one of those 'not good' thoughts to wish death on his friend just because he himself had died. Except he hadn't, for all he felt a bit strange. Like he had been shattered and then glued back together again and the glue hadn't quite set.

And he noticed the various machines and wires and wondered if that random thought hadn't been quite accurate.

John looked fuzzier than usual, not because of his sweater so much as that he hadn't shaved. He looked quite worn, in fact, and nothing like an angel ought to look. Sherlock opened his mouth to tell him but his voice only made a croaking noise and his throat felt a bit like shards of glass had been shoved down it and he decided not to do that. And sometime between deciding that and blinking he fell back asleep.

It was, in fact, two days later that the world resolved itself into making proper sense and allow for conversation. At some point John finally got a shave but he still looked a bit gray and unwell and not quite John-like, a fact which Sherlock informed him of. And John told Sherlock all about how close Sherlock had come to being really truly forever dead, and he better never do something so monumentally stupid ever again as to run off ahead of men trained to take on gun wielding thugs and other nobodies who might every once in a while happen to get in a lucky shot, and in fact he wasn't to take cases when John was away at work at all. It was a new Rule. Sherlock thought about being annoyed but then he thought about the Alone and then he was squeezing John's hand while the heart monitor raced and until his breathing eased.

And John told him he was going to be alright. And he wasn't lying.

The End. Maybe. I might come back to this and expand (exactly where was he hit and how much damage did it do? Being alive and alright isn't exactly the same as not permanently injured in some life-effecting way). I dunno yet; I just kind of got this all out in one go when the muse hit me.


End file.
